1. Field of The Invention
The apparatus of the present invention relates to security in vehicles. More particularly, the present invention relates to an apparatus mountable to the steering wheel of a powered vehicle, and which functions in relationship to the dashboard for preventing the turning of the steering wheel for maintaining the steering wheel inoperable while the apparatus is locked into position.
2. General Background
In the art of rendering a powered vehicle such as an automobile or the like secure from theft, many attempts have been made to accomplish this end. Other than the standard door locks on powered vehicles, in recent times, for the most part, vehicles have been further secured with a mechanical lock within the steering column of the automobile, so that when key of the automobile is removed, the steering wheel is locked into position and cannot be turned.
However, the mechanisms for accomplishing this end are somewhat fragile, and a thief, once he has gained entry into the automobile, quite easily is able to pry his way into the mechanism, and render it ineffective. Thus, he is able to operate the steering once the automobile has been "hot-wired", and it can be driven away.
Therefore, there is a need in securing automobiles to provide a mechanism or means for assuring that an automobile is rendered undrivable after the owner has left the automobile. One of the areas which has been found to be promising is to render the steering wheel inoperable, with the use of an apparatus other than the internal locking mechanism previously described. There have been several patents in the field which address the securing of automobiles, the most pertinent being as follows:
______________________________________ PATENT NO. PATENTEE TITLE ______________________________________ 3,190,090 Zaidener "Anti-Theft Device For Road Vehicles" 3,348,391 Barnwell "Steering Wheel Lock For Automobiles" 3,828,593 Bolton "Anti-Theft Device For Vehicles" 4,103,524 Mitchell "Theftproof Steering Wheel Lock" 4,134,282 Callahan "Motor Vehicle Anti-Theft Device" 4,304,110 Fain "Steering Wheel Lock Bar" 4,444,030 Dausch "Device For Theft-Proving Vehicles" 4,738,127 Johnson "Automobile Steering Lock" 4,829,797 Wu "Steering Wheel Lock" 4,882,920 Wu "Steering Lock For Automobile" ______________________________________